Where now for Zaheer Khan?

Is 34-year old Zaheer Khan past his ‘use-by’ date? Or does he still have that bit of juice dear enough to be squeezed out before being discarded? It’s a judgement call that the national selectors would find extremely difficult to make, for the left-arm fast-medium bowler is not just another run-of-the-mill cricketer.

What makes Zaheer exceptional is the fact that quality fast bowlers of India are almost as rare as a hen’s teeth. In fact, in the last three decades, Indian cricket has thrown up only three fast bowlers of world-class calibre: Kapil Dev, Javagal Srinath and Zaheer. That’s an average of one every 10 years!

Of course, there has been any number of good medium-fast bowlers during this period such as Madan Lal, Roger Binny, Manoj Prabhakar, Venkatesh Prasad, Ishant Sharma, S Sreesanth and Ashish Nehra. But only Kapil Dev, Javagal Srinath and Zaheer have been truly outstanding.

But Zaheer, of late, is a pale shadow of the crafty paceman who, between 2007 and 2010, was a handful to most batsmen in world cricket. However, the Zaheer we saw in the first three Tests against England was jaded, pedestrian and anything but threatening. He picked up just four wickets in the three Tests and it came as no surprise that he was one of the first seniors to be axed after the Kolkata debacle.

Zaheer, when he first burst into international cricket in 2000, was raw but extremely sharp. He delivered a very deceptive bouncer, which he used often with good effect. He had an excellent yorker and his stock ball was the one that was angled across right-handers.

In fact, Zaheer was actually a pretty one-dimensional bowler those days. If batsmen kept his yorkers out, there was little that Zaheer had as a counter. He preferred bowling over the wicket and just swung or angled the ball towards slip. He did not have the ability to bring the ball back into the right-handers and hence was predictable and relatively uncomplicated to handle. He was sharp with the new ball, but quite ordinary with the old one. Of course, those were the days when Zaheer leapt high on the delivery stride in an effort to get side-on and he really bent his back. Pace was his forte and when on song he could really make most batsmen hop around in discomfort.

The important thing, however, was that in his initial five years in international cricket, Zaheer learnt that pace was not everything. International batsmen were not going to be overawed by his pace and hence he needed a few variations to keep them on their toes. He opted for a stint in English county cricket and that supremely embellished his repertoire.

Zaheer returned from the county scene a much-improved ‘old pro’.  His delivery stride leap was more controlled; he dropped a notch or two in pace and most importantly came up with a bag-load of variations.

He learnt how to bring the ball into the right hander and this immediately doubled the threat he posed to batsmen. He polished his ability to bowl round the wicket, came up with sharp swinging in-dippers at the slog, reverse-swung the old ball like a seasoned professional and came up with variations like the knuckle ball, slow spin, palm-release ball, the slow bouncer, etc.

The transition of Zaheer from a raw tearaway to a fast bowler of extraordinary skill and controlled aggression was complete. He was now a master of fast-medium bowling, and being a left-armer he added a new dimension to his skills. For good effect, Zaheer could be lethal with both new and old ball.

He had mastered reverse swing and was now bowling at the ideal pace to make it count.
Thus, from 2007 to 2010, Zaheer remained a force to reckon with. He bagged wickets consistently and was never really dominated by any batsman in any form of cricket. However, all the bowling and endless travel were taking a heavy toll on his fitness.

Try as he did, a series of injuries — back, groin, hamstring, ankle, calf and the like — pegged him back. Fitness now became an issue and some minor injury or the other have dogged him these last few years.

The injuries seem to have forced him to make minor adjustments in his bowling. As a consequence, the ability to bring the ball into the right-hander seemed to have deserted him in the series against England. He was no longer the old fox when it came to reverse swing and most batsmen played him with no apparent discomfort. In addition, Zaheer seemed to have dropped a notch or two in pace. Thus, he hasn’t quite been the feared bowler he once was.

The selectors might have done the right thing by dropping him. But the point is, is Zaheer lost to India forever? In order to prove that he has lost none of his skills by way of reverse-swing, in-swing from over the wicket, pacy yorkers and the like, Zaheer simply has to go back to domestic cricket.

But after 12 tiring years of international cricket, whether he still has the stomach to play Ranji Trophy and Duleep Trophy matches in dusty towns and small cities in an effort to regain the selectors’ confidence is a different matter altogether.